


I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong

by Chronicler



Category: One Direction (Band), zayn malik - Fandom
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Angst, Canon Compliant, Character(s) of Color, Complicated Relationships, Drabble, Endings, Friendship, Gen, I Made Myself Cry, Inspired by Real Events, M/M, Open to Interpretation, Pain, Pet Names, Queer Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-29
Updated: 2015-03-29
Packaged: 2018-03-20 04:52:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3637434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chronicler/pseuds/Chronicler
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just a little drabble about Zayn leaving One Direction. Unsurprisingly, it's heavy on the angst.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong

**Author's Note:**

> This is more about how I feel, I guess, than what actually happened, because who the fuck knows.
> 
> Thanks to Elenlith and Sada for beta reading.
> 
> Sorry I keep deleting my stories, it's due to real life trauma. But I just wrote this quickly & thought I'd post it for a little while.
> 
> Zayn leaving 1D is literally nothing compared to what's happened in my real life. But still, it's made me sad as fuck. I can't believe I'm crying over a band.
> 
> It'll look best if you let AO3 use the skin I made.
> 
> Poem: Funeral Blues by W H Auden ~ http://allpoetry.com/Funeral-Blues
> 
> This is a new edit of the story.

_ _

x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x

_He was my North, my South, my East and West,_   
_My working week and my Sunday rest,_   
_My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;_   
_I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong._

x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x

It was strange for Liam, having a dressing room to himself before a concert. Strange to not have Zayn there, the ephemeral hazel of his eyes shifting under the harsh lights, always watching, waiting, yearning. But he’d be back soon. There was no need to worry, question, plan: Zayn was only going to miss three shows, less if he came back earlier than expected. But currently Zayn was over seven thousand miles away in London, and Liam felt the distance of each mile, the chasm separating them. Even when surrounded by thousands of people screaming his name, Liam felt strangely alone if Zayn wasn't by his side – he always had.

Once he was dressed and styled, hair tamed, Liam made his way to the room where they were hanging out backstage before their performance. Harry and Louis were sitting close together at a table, laughing as they looked through a trashy gossip magazine. Niall was lounging on the couch, tuning his guitar. The air-conditioned room was cool in contrast to the blazing Malaysian heat outside, the furniture mismatched but comfortable. Bottles of water, bags of crisps, chocolate, fruit were scattered over every available surface, along with scraps of notepaper covered in scrawled, half-finished lyrics.

It was all so normal, exactly as it had been for years. Other people came and went, but it was always the five of them in the end. Well, four tonight, but Zayn would be back. He’d come back like he’d never been away. This was how it was meant to be, how it should always be, his band of brothers: 'ride or die' as their fans said.

When his phone rang in his pocket, vibrating through him, he half expected it, even if he’d half convinced himself he didn’t. He would have known who it was even if it hadn’t played the ringtone he used for Zayn. A song they’d danced to once upon a time, a half-forgotten memory.

The others all glanced up at him. Pulling out his phone he raised his other hand; Niall stilled, the discordant sounds from his guitar falling silent before he placed it by his side.

“Hey babe,” Liam said as he answered, “I miss you.”

“I wanted you to hear it from me first, not the lawyers, not some twat from a tabloid asking your reaction,” Zayn said, without preamble, but there was a hitch in his voice, and it sounded raw, like he’d been doing too much talking, too much yelling, too much crying. “I’m not coming back, I’m leaving the band.”

The words crashed into Liam like a tsunami, his chest constricting painfully, his heart stuttering. The gulf between them became more than miles, the earth splitting apart, tidal waves surging as mountains crumbled into the sea. “Sweetheart – I know you need some time, but just rest and then come back. Or maybe just come back and finish the tour.” He drew in a quick, shaky breath before plunging on, afraid of what might be said if he stopped talking. “Things’ll be different afterwards, I promise, we were gonna take a break anyway. We can go away together, just you and me, find the ‘place that nobody knows’, I’ll –”

“ _Liam_ , just stop. It’s too late. I just – I’m sorry, but it’s too late. I can’t do this anymore, any of it. It's all fake as fuck, and I need to do something legit, something that’ll make me happy. There’s –”

“But what –” Liam started to ask.

“– nothing you can say that’s gonna make any difference.” Zayn didn’t stop talking, his usually soft voice growing louder, so often drowned out by others when he wasn’t singing. “I wanna, like, stand on my own, make music I'm proud of, yeah? Work with people who understand me and aren't just fronting. It’s like we’re putting up an image of something we're not anymore, maybe never were. We're not kids, we're not harmless, or sanitised, and we're fucking each other! You fucking _know_ all this, and we've talked about it enough times. You knew this was coming, and I can't keep waiting.”

Zayn finally paused, took a shaky breath of his own before he carried on, sounding wound so tight he might snap. “I've got some commitments to keep, then I'm out of all the bullshit, and I can just work, just live. I'm sorry, I thought I could deal with telling you myself, but I just – I can't. I have to go now.” The line went dead, without even a solid dial tone to mark the occasion. Just nothing. Like none of it had ever happened. Five years wiped out in an instant.

"But what about us?" Liam asked the silence, knowing there would be no answer. Saliva filled his mouth and he fought the urge to throw up. 

Fumbling at the screen he called Zayn back. “Hi, this is Zayn Malik, leave a mess–” Zayn’s far more composed voicemail answered immediately. Liam disconnected without leaving a message. He could yell, beg, cry, but it wouldn’t help.

"That was Zayn, right? Course it was, who the fuck else could it be," Louis said, shaking his head at himself. He stood up, his voice tight as he asked, "What’d he say?”

“That he’s not coming back.” Liam sat heavily on the couch, still staring down at the phone clasped tightly in his hand, blurred through the unshed tears prickling his eyes.

“ _Shit_ ,” Harry muttered. "You mean now, or –"

"I mean he's never coming back," Liam said with a finality he didn't really feel, didn't think he'd ever really feel. This chapter of their lives was finished, and he didn’t know how long the band could struggle on without Zayn. But his and Zayn's undefined and now brittle relationship would never truly be over. Some things twist and turn, fall apart and are cobbled back together, descend into silence or erupt into screams, but never truly end. Even though he and Zayn were going to be apart, whether for the time being or forever, it would never really be over for him. And he'd wait, wait and hope Zayn would come back to him one day, and that he could be there if Zayn flew too close to the sun, crashed and burned, always ready to pick up the pieces and put him back together.

All their phones started to ring at once, cutting through the oppressive, shocked silence weighing down on them. Tense voices and hurried footsteps reached them from the corridor as the world caught up with what was happening, the news spreading like wildfire. _“Fuck_ ,”Liam murmured as he turned off his phone. He couldn't put on an act yet for all the people he was going to have to deal with and try to placate. He scrubbed at his eyes with the heels of his hands, silent as tears finally escaped.

Louis pulled Harry away, voices hushed as they comforted each other.

“He won’t be able to stay away for long, mate. He'll sort himself out, try some new things, then he’ll change his mind and come join us again,” Niall said, putting his arm around Liam, squeezing his shoulder.

“No. He won’t,” Liam said, his voice flat and distant, the world suddenly impossibly big and impossibly empty.

_**The end** _


End file.
